American gamer Kornelia known as Queen of Quake, ready to take on all-comers

Neil Davidson
Canadian Press

She has been dubbed the Queen of Quake and only needs to go by her first name in gaming circles.

Budapest-born Kornelia Takacs (pronounced Tock-ASH) has made her name in first-person shooters like Quake and Doom. Deathmatch mode is her bread and butter. And Kornelia rarely loses.

At the QuakeCon convention in Dallas in August (billed as four days of peace, love and rockets), the 27-year-old pro gamer who now calls California home took on all-comers at Doom III in what was billed The Kornelia Challenge.

There were gasps -- and cheers for the underdog -- when the first opponent went up 4-0.

"He really surprised me," Kornelia recalled from California. "He really did play well and it really threw me off."

Still Kornelia kept her calm and rallied to dispatch him 6-4. She won all 36 matches in all, blanking her opposition in 30 of them.

Kornelia admits she loses occasionally at such shows.

"It does happen and it's very surprising to both of us," she says matter-of-factly.

But her winning rate remains impressive. She usually plays 200 exhibition matches over a three-day show and reckons she might suffer one loss.

"That is actually great because you learn from that," she said. "Unless it happens in a tournament, in which case it's not the best thing. But hey, you win some, you lose some."

There is more to Kornelia than fragging rival gamers, however.

She works in the accounting department of a film production company in Santa Monica. She enjoys the challenge and the people, but says "the only downside is I have to get up relatively early."

That tends to limit gaming time in the evening.

She's also studying guitar and film at a local college.

While she says she still has time for gaming, occasionally her job has to take precedence. That happened recently when a business trip to Munich meant she couldn't attend the recent World Cyber Games in San Francisco.

Kornelia isn't that concerned about being a female gaming star in a largely male world. Her view is that gender is unimportant when it comes to being behind the keyboard.